CYHA News

The Monthly Newsletter of Chelmsford YHA Local Group

August 2009

There’s More to This Than Beer & Icecream

Our Lulworth weekend proved to be a bit of a scorcher. With temperatures over 30ºC we took to the chalky ridges of the Dorset coast. Saturday’s walk was an epic 14.5 miles as we climbed hills and crossed valleys across the Lulworth Ranges. The path was easy to follow, which was lucky given the dire warnings about unexploded ordnance should you wander too far. As if to underline the point the valley was littered with blown-up former tanks. The theme of destruction was continued in nature as the path teetered along cliff edges, brilliant white from recent rock falls. By contrast the valleys were lush and green – but oh those hills! Was there no end to them? We were up and down all day and the heat had us all lobster pink and running low on water. No surprise then that on reaching Lulworth Cove several of the group took to the water to cool down. Preferring icecream to seawater, Dave and I pressed on accompanied by Fergus to re-adjust our blood sugar with a triple scoop Belgian waffle cone washed down by some real ale from the pub near the hostel. Well, after 14.5 miles we thought we deserved it!

Saturday night saw us celebrating Margaret’s birthday with fizzy wine and Doug’s delicious chicken cacciatore followed by Wimbledonesque strawberries and cream. Mmmm.

After Jim’s Sunday morning fry-up, you’d think everyone would be fired for another day’s cliff-bashing, but for most the walk stopped at Durdle Door, when the call of the cool ocean on another hot day proved just too hard to resist.

Ali

The Pidley Poddle

Well I for one was under the impression that Cambridgeshire was flat fenland, but not so the bit round Pidley. Whilst not exactly the Alps, there were hills enough to see where they got the idea for the Pidley Mountain Rescue Team (actually a charity fund-raising club, named because Pidley, at 88 feet above sea level, is the highest point in the fens).

We covered the morning part of the walk pretty quickly, so were forced to have an early first lunch to avoid arriving at the pub embarrassingly early. As it turned out this was immaculate timing as the showers that had been threatening all morning finally erupted into a downpour just as we reached shelter. This encouraged us to enjoy an even more leisurely drink than we might have had otherwise as we waited for the shower to pass.

It was a slightly shorter route back and overall we clocked up nearly 9 miles. Surely enough to justify the sumptuous spread Marion put on for us to round off the day?

Ali

Belated Thanks from Lorna & Nick

I have just opened our wedding present!! Embarrassing!

We've been trying to work out who gave us the Marriage Survival Kit -we were out on Friday 1st with the runners, who gave us a thong and negligee respectively, so we assumed it had come from them.

So it was just yesterday that I finally opened it and found the CASH! and Bank of Love slips, and 2/5/2010 card, etc.

It is a brilliant present in every respect, and I'm sorry it has taken us so long to open it! Thank you all.

We have, as you may have gathered, been very pre-occupied with honeymoon, and house, and change-of-address stuff, and so on.

In the first two weeks of May we travelled to Gairloch, Ullapool, Lochinver, Durness, up Ben Loyal, to Castle Mey, and went putting at St Andrews.

Since moving into this house we (Nick) has put a built-in cupboard in one room, and built a shower in the bathroom. Thank you all for the DIY vouchers!

Lorna & Nick

The _^^Ulster Scots Alternative

As the Knoydart expedition was returning to Essex, we were heading in the opposite direction, to Northern Ireland, to climb the Mourne Mountains, and bag the highest peak in Northern Ireland; Slieve Donard at 849m.

Since we didn’t have the time, the original environmentally friendly plan to cycle to Stranraer, and then pedalo across the Irish Sea was abandoned in favour of Easy Jet and a hire car, to get to Newcastle, in County Down.

The first day was fantastic, warm and sunny, so we decided to do Slieve Donard while the weather was good, as did a hundred or so charity walkers. The 360° views were great, and we could see the Isle Of Man very clearly. Since Newcastle is a seaside town, we climbed all of those 849m, plus 4 more to the trig-point, which stands on a tower, at a corner of the Mourne wall. The Mourne Wall runs 22 miles between the summits that ring the Mournes, and was built to keep riff-raff, such as hikers, out of the catchment area of the Belfast Water Works’ reservoirs.

The good weather continued and we spent another couple of days in the Mournes, climbing Slieve Binnian, Slieve Meelmore and Slieve Meelbeg.

Although there is probably enough walking in The Mournes to last for a week we could not resist the lure of Strangford Lough. With its fishing villages, sandy beaches and rolling green fields, the area around the Lough looks much like Cornwall. We made the short crossing on the ferry to the picture-postcard Portaferry and toured round the Ards peninsular on a day when Northern Ireland was the warmest place in the UK.

We then moved on to Omagh in County Tyrone, roughly in the middle of Northern Ireland, by way of Slieve Gullion, a 500m mountain, on the border, and Armagh.

Outside Belfast, no town in the Six Counties is that large: possibly the most attractive of these is Armagh with pleasant Georgian streets, parks and museums. It also has 2 St Patrick’s cathedrals, one Church of Ireland and the very fine Catholic cathedral in an impressive setting. It was once the centre of the Catholic faith in all Ireland and, built on seven hills, it has been called ‘Irish Rome’ perhaps that’s pushing things a bit far but we did have Roman weather!

We spent a day in the Sperrin Mountains, which are green, boggy and rolling in contrast to the jagged granite tops of the Mournes. The weather had turned, so T-shirt and sun-cream made way for fleece and Gore-Tex.

For the last day, we visited Enniskillen and Lough Erne in County Fermanagh, and thus had visited all 6 counties of Northern Ireland in one trip, if walking a few yards into County Londonderry/Derry counts.

We stayed in two hostels. Newcastle is an official HINI hostel on the sea-front, where we had a room with a sea view to ourselves for most of the time. It felt much like a Scottish hostel, and was well placed. Omagh was an independent ex-HINI hostel on a farm 2½ miles out of Omagh, and sadly 2½ miles from the pub.

Like the Antrim trip in 2003, we visited some of the best sights in Northern Ireland, but there is still more to see and do; perhaps enough to tempt the group back for a future trip.

Tom & Jim

Jim and Tom will show us some pictures of their trip at our slideshow evening on 30th September. And you can see a preview of some more of Jim's photos here

Please send any comments on these pages to Dave Plummer

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		CYHA News The Monthly Newsletter of Chelmsford YHA Local Group August 2009

		*There’s More to This Than Beer & Icecream* Our Lulworth weekend proved to be a bit of a scorcher. With temperatures over 30ºC we took to the chalky ridges of the Dorset coast. Saturday’s walk was an epic 14.5 miles as we climbed hills and crossed valleys across the Lulworth Ranges. The path was easy to follow, which was lucky given the dire warnings about unexploded ordnance should you wander too far. As if to underline the point the valley was littered with blown-up former tanks. The theme of destruction was continued in nature as the path teetered along cliff edges, brilliant white from recent rock falls. By contrast the valleys were lush and green – but oh those hills! Was there no end to them? We were up and down all day and the heat had us all lobster pink and running low on water. No surprise then that on reaching Lulworth Cove several of the group took to the water to cool down. Preferring icecream to seawater, Dave and I pressed on accompanied by Fergus to re-adjust our blood sugar with a triple scoop Belgian waffle cone washed down by some real ale from the pub near the hostel. Well, after 14.5 miles we thought we deserved it! Saturday night saw us celebrating Margaret’s birthday with fizzy wine and Doug’s delicious chicken cacciatore followed by Wimbledonesque strawberries and cream. Mmmm. After Jim’s Sunday morning fry-up, you’d think everyone would be fired for another day’s cliff-bashing, but for most the walk stopped at Durdle Door, when the call of the cool ocean on another hot day proved just too hard to resist. Ali The Pidley Poddle Well I for one was under the impression that Cambridgeshire was flat fenland, but not so the bit round Pidley. Whilst not exactly the Alps, there were hills enough to see where they got the idea for the Pidley Mountain Rescue Team (actually a charity fund-raising club, named because Pidley, at 88 feet above sea level, is the highest point in the fens). We covered the morning part of the walk pretty quickly, so were forced to have an early first lunch to avoid arriving at the pub embarrassingly early. As it turned out this was immaculate timing as the showers that had been threatening all morning finally erupted into a downpour just as we reached shelter. This encouraged us to enjoy an even more leisurely drink than we might have had otherwise as we waited for the shower to pass. It was a slightly shorter route back and overall we clocked up nearly 9 miles. Surely enough to justify the sumptuous spread Marion put on for us to round off the day? Ali Belated Thanks from Lorna & Nick I have just opened our wedding present!! Embarrassing! We've been trying to work out who gave us the Marriage Survival Kit -we were out on Friday 1st with the runners, who gave us a thong and negligee respectively, so we assumed it had come from them. So it was just yesterday that I finally opened it and found the CASH! and Bank of Love slips, and 2/5/2010 card, etc. It is a brilliant present in every respect, and I'm sorry it has taken us so long to open it! Thank you all. We have, as you may have gathered, been very pre-occupied with honeymoon, and house, and change-of-address stuff, and so on. In the first two weeks of May we travelled to Gairloch, Ullapool, Lochinver, Durness, up Ben Loyal, to Castle Mey, and went putting at St Andrews. Since moving into this house we (Nick) has put a built-in cupboard in one room, and built a shower in the bathroom. Thank you all for the DIY vouchers! Lorna & Nick The _^^Ulster Scots Alternative As the Knoydart expedition was returning to Essex, we were heading in the opposite direction, to Northern Ireland, to climb the Mourne Mountains, and bag the highest peak in Northern Ireland; Slieve Donard at 849m. Since we didn’t have the time, the original environmentally friendly plan to cycle to Stranraer, and then pedalo across the Irish Sea was abandoned in favour of Easy Jet and a hire car, to get to Newcastle, in County Down. The first day was fantastic, warm and sunny, so we decided to do Slieve Donard while the weather was good, as did a hundred or so charity walkers. The 360° views were great, and we could see the Isle Of Man very clearly. Since Newcastle is a seaside town, we climbed all of those 849m, plus 4 more to the trig-point, which stands on a tower, at a corner of the Mourne wall. The Mourne Wall runs 22 miles between the summits that ring the Mournes, and was built to keep riff-raff, such as hikers, out of the catchment area of the Belfast Water Works’ reservoirs. The good weather continued and we spent another couple of days in the Mournes, climbing Slieve Binnian, Slieve Meelmore and Slieve Meelbeg. Although there is probably enough walking in The Mournes to last for a week we could not resist the lure of Strangford Lough. With its fishing villages, sandy beaches and rolling green fields, the area around the Lough looks much like Cornwall. We made the short crossing on the ferry to the picture-postcard Portaferry and toured round the Ards peninsular on a day when Northern Ireland was the warmest place in the UK. We then moved on to Omagh in County Tyrone, roughly in the middle of Northern Ireland, by way of Slieve Gullion, a 500m mountain, on the border, and Armagh. Outside Belfast, no town in the Six Counties is that large: possibly the most attractive of these is Armagh with pleasant Georgian streets, parks and museums. It also has 2 St Patrick’s cathedrals, one Church of Ireland and the very fine Catholic cathedral in an impressive setting. It was once the centre of the Catholic faith in all Ireland and, built on seven hills, it has been called ‘Irish Rome’ perhaps that’s pushing things a bit far but we did have Roman weather! We spent a day in the Sperrin Mountains, which are green, boggy and rolling in contrast to the jagged granite tops of the Mournes. The weather had turned, so T-shirt and sun-cream made way for fleece and Gore-Tex. For the last day, we visited Enniskillen and Lough Erne in County Fermanagh, and thus had visited all 6 counties of Northern Ireland in one trip, if walking a few yards into County Londonderry/Derry counts. We stayed in two hostels. Newcastle is an official HINI hostel on the sea-front, where we had a room with a sea view to ourselves for most of the time. It felt much like a Scottish hostel, and was well placed. Omagh was an independent ex-HINI hostel on a farm 2½ miles out of Omagh, and sadly 2½ miles from the pub. Like the Antrim trip in 2003, we visited some of the best sights in Northern Ireland, but there is still more to see and do; perhaps enough to tempt the group back for a future trip. Tom & Jim Jim and Tom will show us some pictures of their trip at our slideshow evening on 30th September. And you can see a preview of some more of Jim's photos here
Please send any comments on these pages to Dave Plummer